Film

The Ten

Name: The Ten
Genre: Comedy
Released: 2007
Cast: Paul Rudd, Adam Brody, Jon Hamm, Winona Ryder, Ken Marino

Comedy
Dip in and out

David Wain's absurdist comedy riffs on the Ten Commandments through ten unrelated sketches. It's deliberately shapeless, tonally anarchic, and committed to jokes that land sideways. For people who loved Wet Hot American Summer's anything-goes energy and don't mind a film that prioritizes weird laughs over narrative coherence.

TMDb rating

2.4

If you liked this

Wet Hot American Summer2001

David Wain's debut has the same maximalist comedy DNA—a crowded ensemble, bizarre non-sequiturs, and absolute commitment to bits that shouldn't work but do. It's the spiritual sibling.

But The humour is deliberately anti-climactic and absurdist; if you need jokes to land neatly, this won't click.

The Kentucky Fried Movie1977

A sketch-comedy film that proved the format could sustain a feature. It's crude, fearless, and jumps between ideas with gleeful abandon—the grandfather of what Wain is attempting.

But Dated references and a leering sensibility mean parts feel stuck in the seventies. Unevenness is baked in.

Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping2016

Andy Samberg and the Lonely Island's sketch sensibility applied to mockumentary. Anarchic, packed with gags, and unafraid to kill its own momentum for a joke. Same comedic appetite.

But The target is very specific (pop culture absurdity). If you don't find that funny conceptually, the jokes won't rescue it.

Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Ten

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

V/H/S2012

Both use anthology structure and formal fragmentation not for narrative but as a means itself. The Ten applies this to absurdist comedy; VHS applies it to folk horror, proving the framework is neutral.

A found-footage horror anthology that uses the sketch structure—multiple unrelated stories, tonal chaos, formal rule-breaking. It shows how The Ten's approach works in pure horror mode, no irony required.

But It's visceral and genuinely disturbing, with practical gore effects that won't feel funny. Some segments are designed to repel rather than entertain.

I ♥ Huckabees2004

David O. Russell's existential comedy is similarly overstuffed with ideas, tonal whiplash, and an ensemble trapped in escalating weirdness. Mad, ambitious, and genuinely strange.

But It's more pretentious and exhausting than fun. The messiness feels intentional but also occasionally like it's falling apart.

Rubber2010

A French absurdist film about a sentient tire that kills people. Completely uninterested in making conventional sense, it's pure conceptual comedy—anarchic without apology.

But It's aggressively weird and plotless. Patience and appetite for pure formal oddity required; don't expect coherence or satisfaction.

Enter the Void2010

Gaspar Noé's psychedelic nightmare uses visual excess and formal rule-breaking the way The Ten uses sketch randomness. Both are intoxicated with possibility.

But This is 161 minutes of visual sensory overload with minimal dialogue. It's exhausting and occasionally nauseating by design.

The Holy Mountain1973

Jodorowsky's surrealist masterpiece is packed with wild, disconnected imagery linked by metaphor rather than plot. Same DNA: structure as liberation, logic as the enemy of comedy.

But It's genuinely difficult—hermetic, symbolic, and deeply inaccessible. You'll need sustained tolerance for not understanding what you're watching.

Troop Beverly Hills1989

A comedy that doesn't care if its premise makes sense, prioritizing ensemble charm and absurdist energy over plot mechanics. Lightweight but genuinely fun.

But It's sitcom-broad and occasionally saccharine. The humour is soft-edged where The Ten swings wildly.

Kika1993

Both films treat comedy as formal experimentation rather than setup-punchline mechanics. Plot is incidental to texture, character, and anarchic invention.

Pedro Almodóvar's maximalist comedy operates in pure artifice—bold colours, arbitrary tonal shifts, characters who don't obey conventional logic. It's heightened where The Ten is deadpan, but same anarchic spirit.

But It's European and very '90s in its sensibility. The tone is campy rather than blank, and the plot involves sexual violence treated as comedy—uncomfortable even if intentional.

A Film Unfinished2010

Both films distrust traditional narrative logic and instead build meaning through juxtaposition, gaps, and refusal to resolve. One is absurdist comedy, one is historical trauma—but both believe fractured form can communicate truth better than wholeness.

Yael Hersonski's documentary about Nazi propaganda footage is structurally fragmented and resists easy interpretation. It uses montage and absence the way The Ten uses non-sequitur—to make meaning through rupture rather than continuity.

But This is a Holocaust documentary. It's difficult, slow, and emotionally demanding. The connection might feel perverse—comedy and genocide are not natural neighbours.